Of the eight suspects detectives have mind, three are thought to have been employees at the Ocean Club where the McCann family was staying

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British cops probing the disappearance of missing Madeleine McCann have identified eight key suspects they want to interview.

A team of detectives from the Met Police flew into Portugal on Wednesday for a series of top level meetings with Portuguese counterparts after being given the green light to launch a series of searches across at least three sites in Praia da Luz.

The Met team consists of six investigators of whom two are specialist forensic officers specialising in body searches.

The team will meet the head of the Portuguese police in the Algarve today at the central police station in Faro, 60 miles from the resort where Madeleine went missing in May 2007.

Local reports today claimed the series of meetings between Brit and Portuguese cops were to "define the operations to find Maddie's body".

However the Met has previously claimed the renewed searches are as a result of a review of evidence already gathered by the Portuguese over the last seven years and not necessarily connected to finding Madeleine's body.

Of the eight suspects identified by the Met Police team working on a review of the evidence, codenamed Operation Grange, three suspects are believed to be former employees of the Ocean Club apartments where the McCann's stayed.

The Met has already been refused permission to interview them or examine their bank accounts as part of a probe to see if they had accepted money that could be linked to a possible crime.

Another suspect is understood to be heroin addict Euclides Montero, another former Ocean Club worker.

He was killed in a tractor accident in 2008, the same year Portuguese cops linked him to a series of burglaries and sex attacks across the Algarve.

The Met detectives are understood to be "fine tuning" the details of a series of searches across an area of wasteland just yards from the Ocean Club , a cobbled road close to the town's 16th century church and a car park near the beach.

It is not known when exactly the searches will commence but sources claimed the presence of specialist forensic officers could be a sign that the digs are just days away.